battlefieldfandomcom-20200223-history
Refractor
The Refractor engine, is a game engine designed by Stockholm-based studio Refraction Games, first developed for the computer game, Codename Eagle, which was released in March 2000. After this, Refraction Games was purchased by Digital Illusions CE and the Refractor 2 engine was developed for use in the Battlefield Series on PC. The development of Battlefield: Bad Company marked the end of DICE's use of the engine in favor of their new Frostbite Engine. The engine, however, continued to be used in the free-to-play online games in the series by Easy Studios (such as Battlefield Play4Free), along with some input by DICE, until 2015, when the free to play games were shut down. Games Refractor *''Codename Eagle'' (2000) *''Battlefield 1942'' (2002) *''RalliSport Challenge'' (2002) *''Battlefield Vietnam'' (2004) Refractor 2 *''Battlefield 2'' (2005) *''Battlefield 2142'' (2006) *''Battlefield Heroes'' (2009) *''Battlefield Online'' (2010) *''Battlefield Play4Free'' (2011) Damage Refractor 2-era Battlefield games pre-''Battlefield 2'' have a material-based damage system rather than a direct, weapon-based damage system. This means that damage is determined by the type of material a weapon spawns in its barrel rather than the weapon itself. This can make deciphering the intended damage of a weapon rather cryptic, as there are several factors in determining final damage. Post-''Battlefield 2'', the damage is determined on a per-weapon basis, inside of the weapon's configuration file itself. However, the material pairings remain the determinant factor in final damage. Material Firstly, the MaterialManager.materialDamage line within the materialManagerDefine configuration file determines how much basic damage a material does. The weapon of interest has an objects configuration file in its primary directory. This file usually has a ObjectTemplate.projectileTemplate line which determines what kind of projectile it fires. Sometimes it's specific, and sometimes what is written is vague. For example, the M14's is SniperProjectile. The objects/handweapons/common file directory has a configuration file named projectile. This sets down which projectile type refers to which material type. In SniperProjectile's case, it is material 218. Going back to the MaterialManagerDefine file, one can search for said material by searching for, in this case, 218. It can be seen that material 218 is placed under the "rifle" heading, and has a materialDamage value of 5. Modified One issue with Battlefield Vietnam is the unaltered usage of Battlefield 1942 damage system files. This means that many of the weapons used in Battlefield Vietnam are either simply renamed Battlefield 1942 files or non-renamed files determining the modified damage. However, if one were to look in each damage system file, the material line is usually unique, so, for example, only one has material 218. In this case, it is under the file "sniper". With that knowledge, it is possible to determine the modified damage based upon what the user is firing upon. There are three infantry groups. Those are materials 40, 41 and 42. For material 40, the damage multiplier is 10 (for the M14, 5*10 = 50, so it would be an instant kill). Material 41 has a multiplier of 3 (15 damage with M14), and material 42 a multiplier of 2 (10 damage with M14). In Battlefield 2, the material manager settings folder, which contains all of the damage multipliers, is comparatively cryptic, as in the older games the material pairings were separated based on material type. There is no organization in Battlefield 2's files. Other modifiers The two other modifiers are damage drop-off over distance and the angle at which the projectile hits its target. The angle damage is determined by Cos(angle) . So, zero degrees means the multiplier remains at 1, while a degree value of 30 changes it to 0.866. The modified damage is applied to this. In the early games, most weapons do not have damage drop-off, mostly just submachine guns and pistols. There are some lines in the objects file of a weapon which state that the damage drop-off begins at a certain distance (for instance 20 meters) and ends at another (for instance 60 meters) The multiplier for the minimum damage possible is also there, but is only applied when the distance to target is its maximum, and usually the multiplier is 1 anyway, so there is no change. Hitpoints Unlike damage, hitpoints are actually determined on a case-by-case basis. Under most circumstances, every vehicle has its own objects configuration file, which lists hitpoints at spawn, maximum hitpoints, et cetera. Kits have a "common" file which has a similar objects file, which also lists hitpoints. All infantry have 30 hitpoints. Vehicles vary based upon the type, although the material they are made of determines the damage multipliers which other materials can be applied to when used against one another. For instance, all rocket launchers have a 20 times multiplier against most aircraft materials (material 60). Templates 's Battlefield Vietnam Objects file. Note all of the objectTemplate lines.]] Almost everything in a Refractor 2 game is based upon a set of object and material templates, which are defined within other file directories. Everything from what the characters wear to what weapons they use to the vehicles that are spawned at the set spawnpoints are determined by a set of object templates in every file. In addition, most object templates are made up of other, less substantial templates. For instance, weapon object templates are usually made up of several, much less substantial parts: a trigger template, a magazine template, a stock template, a chamber template, and a barrel template. The least substantial objects are usually defined as a SimpleObject, meaning that there is nothing else making up the object. Meshes Meshes are usually either under the bundledMesh or skinnedMesh file extension. Meshes are the visual representation of weapons, vehicles, characters, et cetera. All meshes seem to have been made with 3ds Max or a modified version thereof, as that is one of the only programs which accept the different mesh filetypes. There are also collision meshes—these are what actually determine when a visual mesh is contacting another mesh, or when an object with a visual mesh has been hit, and also determines at what angle projectiles hit the mesh. Category:Features of Battlefield Vietnam Category:Features of Battlefield 2142 Category:Features of Battlefield 2 Category:Features of Battlefield Heroes Category:Features of Battlefield Play4Free Category:Features of Battlefield 1942 Category:Features of Battlefield Online Category:Silver Category:Engines of Battlefield